


baja (nineteen)

by cptsuke



Category: Animal Kingdom (TV)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-19
Updated: 2019-11-19
Packaged: 2021-02-13 00:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21485242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cptsuke/pseuds/cptsuke
Summary: deran's surf comp in baja
Comments: 4
Kudos: 19





	baja (nineteen)

The drive down to Baja is hot, sweaty and _perfect_. Deran stretches a leg upwards and rests his foot on the dash. The wind feels like soup, it's so warm, but the humidity is sitting in the high eighties so any sort of breeze still feels like a godsend.

Adrian couldn't afford to come down for the comp which fucking sucks and Deran tells Craig it at least three times as he lights a joint for him a couple of miles past the border. _H__e sho__u__lda asked __S__murf_, he mutters to himself, tilting his tone up at end and eyeing Craig so he knows Deran's kinda sorta asking him the question.

Craig looks at him like he’s actually thinking before he speaks and Deran immediately feels his face screwing up into a scowl. He never feels the years between them so much as when Craig stops and thinks about what he thinks he can tell Deran. Eventually Craig just settles for a shrugging shoulders and a long deep pull of the joint. It sucks, but Deran kinda gets what he means. They're already asking a lot to come down here at all, Smurf had been sweet and loving when she'd said yes, but the last week had been a minefield of moodiness and flower sweet words with sharp barbs hidden in them.

Deran sinks lower in his seat, feeling the stretch in the back of his legs, feeling his knees vibrate gently with the rough road, he presses a cheek against them and closes his eyes. Fuck knows what this is gonna cost when they get home. He turns his face, rubs his face against his knees til his forehead feels bruised by vibrations and the hard bone pressing against his skin.

_It doesn't matter,_ he think, his pretend sleep sinking into something a lot closer to real sleep, _it doesn't matter._

  
  


Deran opens his eyes to bright blue water out the window, the road skirting so close to the water it almost feels like he could put his hand out and feel sea spray. He's got a crick in his neck and half numb legs from his pre-sleep pretzel shape, so he leans side ways, stretches a leg out of the window and dumps his head half on Craig's lap where he's driving one handed with a sandwich in the other.

“Did we stop?” He asks, eyeing the sandwich that Craig definitely didn't have when he went to sleep.

“Mmf,” is Craig's answer, and Deran glares up at him when tiny bits of lettuce wet his face.

“Ugh,” He groans, sitting back up and wiping a sleeve across his face.

When they finally get there, and _finally _park, and _finally _get out of the damned car, the water looks fuck off amazing. Beautiful rolling waves that put home's surf to shame and Deran vibrates with his want to get out there.

Deran tries to not just grab his board and run for the water, keeps his feet flat on the ground, definitely not bouncing on his toes as Craig laughs at whatever his face is doing.

Doesn't matter, this weekend's gonna be great.

  
  


Deran makes it to the final.

It's weird.

It makes him feel weird. Not bad. Just weird. Like maybe this is something he should be doing. He's good at it, he thinks, starting to get so it's not a surprise for everyone involved when he scores high and moves to the next round.

Craig's leaning on his back, supposedly to _get that good stret__c__h_ but Craig’s more than half high and giggling when the strain on Deran's rib cage makes him cough and he almost sets his board shorts on fire when the blunt in his mouth falls out and Deran has to do a hot potato dance to catch it.

Craig laughs again, more of a deeper laugh and snatches the recovered pot from Deran's fingers and claiming it for himself, Deran's feeling pleasantly buzzed enough to not give a fuck, it's Craig's weed anyway.

Craig leans again down on Deran's back and he lets himself go loose with the weight, feels something in his spine give a satisfying _crunch_. He doesn’t know why Craig's not off somewhere between some girl's legs like his usual surf comp _modus operandi_, it makes him feel small but not in a bad way.

He feels like when Craig used to pick him up, used to throw him in the air, used to twirl him upside down til Deran wanted to throw up from laughing, when Craig's bigness had meant he'd get picked up and carted around on shoulders.

He got too big for that too quickly, seemingly from one day to the next, Craig had picked him up and Deran had gotten his first broken nose from Craig fumbling and dropping him face first into the brick pavers next to the pool. Deran's still got a chip in one of his front teeth from the whole thing. Smurf had been so pissed, but his next broken nose had come from when she’d egged Craig on after one of their stupid video game fight, so Deran doesn’t really know what to think about Smurf's quiet rage. He definitely doesn’t think how she never seemed to mind much when she made them hurt.

All in all he felt loose limbed and _good_, last heat he’d smashed out a near perfect 9.8 wave and he likes to think he can still feel the slap one of the older surfers had given his shoulder. That had been someone whose poster hung on his wall, he thinks giddily. _Pope_ had had his photo on his walls back when Pope did normal human stuff like have posters & rooms with personality.

Deran's feeling pretty fucking great. The fact that his final opponent is a fucking little bitch doesn’t even bother him. Five or six years older than Deran, his name was honest to god _Brody _and he wouldn't stop to bragging about how way _way_ ahead in QS points he was compared to Deran. Like that meant anything when Deran's only done Huntington because it happened to be in his neighborhood, and he and Craig were still warming Smurf up to the sort of traveling Real Surf Competing required.

He’s got stupid fluffy hair that curled sun bleached tips around his ears and a sneer for a grin that Deran's probably gonna punch off when he switches from weed to alcohol after the comp is all done.

Near the end of the final Deran gives up priority for a throw away 4 point ride. But he’s not feeling the pressure, he thinks maybe he should care more about the priority lost, but Brody's got a grin on his face like he’s won, like Deran's not already ahead of him in points, style and fucking _class_ because Deran might be an asshole but even he doesn’t spit curses under his breath, like fucking Brody has been doing all day at his fellow competitors.

Still.

He rides every wave Brody doesn’t take, takes a nasty sort of pleasure in riding a discarded wave to a point above his previous 2nd wave and lengthens his lead just that little bit more. There’s a couple minutes left on the clock, less than ten, maybe even less than five, there’s too much salt water in his eyes for Deran to see the clock from out here. His head sounds like roaring blood, the commentators voices are buzzes in the background against the slap of rolling waves.

Brody finally picks a wave, the first in a new set rolling in, the crowd noise picks up, like they're counting down the clock and it’s a good wave. The crowd _roars_ but Deran can't hardly hear them, he bobs over the second wave of the set and is ready when the third rolls in. Heavy and even, it stands up perfectly as Deran drops down its face and fucking _rides it_.

He doesn’t really remember the ride, just the feel of the board under his feet, adrenaline making his heartbeat deafen him, salt on his tongue and the ache in his legs as he pushed for just _a little bit more_ The horn blares out loud and long as he brings his board around the face of the wave for one final maneuver; as the wave closes down he feels his weight shift but he holds it, goes low, knees bending sharp to take the crash of waves threatening to steal his balance, white water in his eyes, up his nose, and then, clear blue sky as he and his board shoot out intact and free of the wave.

Deran holds upright on his board for a few moments longer, takes in the crowd, with its whistles and yelling, the bowed head and tense shoulders of Brody, already on the beach, already in defeat without Deran's final score being called.

Deran drops into the ocean to the sound of a commentator yelling excitedly and 10 flashing up in bright led lights.

He bumbles through the on beach interview, still can’t hear much beyond the roar of blood in his ears but he's still riding high, buzzed from the win, the weed and that perfect, perfect wave. He can’t get the stupid grin off his face even as Craig grabs him at the end of the interview and lifts him off his feet, there’s a lot of touching from the crowd as they make their way away from the shore, back to the behind the scenes area, but everything's good. It’s good. He’s about to hit the showers when an official pulls him aside, tells him ESPN wants to interview him.

That’s okay, Deran thinks then immediately starts freaking out. It's big. _Fuuuucckk_. This is big.

  
  


It's quiet in the showers, all day, heat after heat it's been just as loud and busy as the outside, but the day's winding down and Deran's final was the last of the day, so there's only one shower running, and Deran doesn't have to look to know it's fucking Brody.

He picks a shower far enough away that it's obvious Deans doesn't want to be near him, but not so far away it looks like he's scared. It's an art, but Deran's been a beach baby all his life, and he's suffered through enough PE classes to be a fucking _savant_ at communal showering. Hyper aware on a good day on how he might look to outsider.

Deran spends maybe a little too long in the shower, washing the salt sting out of his eyes, waiting for his heartbeat to settles, enjoying the heat of the water on his aching muscles.

He feels someone standing near him, Deran closes his eyes, face tipped up to the spray of the water, tries to keep his body loose like his fists aren't clenching in anticipation.

“I heard all about you, Cody.” Brody sneers from just behind him.

Deran doesn't say anything, doesn't know what _heard all about him_ means, so he just gives him an unimpressed side eye.

“Rich white trash kid, having your mommy buy your way into everything.”

Deran feels a swell of rage burning in his throat, takes a deeps breath, holds it. He hates that he's alone in here, hates that even here people won't just shut the fuck up.

“You can't buy a ten point wave, asshole.” Deran finally turns, looks him dead in the eye. “_You_ couldn't even get yourself an eight.”

Deran holds the eye contact gets to watch Brody's face reddens, jaw jutting out like he wants to spew more angry words, his mouth works for a moment, opening and closing without saying anything. Eventually he shuts it, glares and _finally _fucking leaves.

Deran ducks his head back under the spray, takes the moment of peace that comes from the water dulling all sound. It doesn't matter what anyone says. _He fucking won._

  
  


When he's done, stepping out of the shower tents, still trying to wring all the water out his hair, trying to find that calm place, the place where he doesn't give a fuck what anyone says, trying to make his face form some other expression but the headache inducing scowl he can feels twisted into, he steps out of the shower tent and his mom is waiting outside the showers. Suddenly just fucking there, in his face and so fucking close.

He thinks - _for_ _a fucking moment – _he thinks he's imagining her. He sees her sometimes, in places she can't possibly be, stupidly he hopes - _he hopes –_that he's doing it this time.

“Mom?” Stupidly, he speaks her name and _she's real_.

She smiles, looking pleased in a way that has Deran looking for Craig. Which is stupid, he’s old enough to deal with his mom by himself, it’s not like she’s that interested in him anymore, not like she used to be. He wonders if she knows, if she can tell he’s built wrong. He hopes not. He thinks if she knew, she would have used it against him by now. Would have said something one of the times she got mean, one of the times she really meant to hurt him. She can’t know.

Smurf doesn’t seem to realize or notice him having his own personal crisis. Just lets him stew in his own silence, cos she’d always been the sorta cruel that didn’t explain easy.

“Hey baby,” she says, her arms shifting to a more open stance, wrists turning outward, inviting him in.

“What are you doing here?” He thinks, if he weren't so surprised, maybe he'd have been more polite. A little bit more _diplomatic._

All that inviting posture disappears and she steps closer. He doesn’t think, well, he doesn't know. Smurfs never come to any of his comps, never even mentions them much, like maybe if she ignored them hard enough Deran would get the hint and stop. Or so he’d thought. Stupid stupid _stupid_. Smurf's pleased smile doesn’t look so nice anymore, “_N__ow baby”_ she says.

He feels like prey, half frozen, can feel the part of his brain that reacts to things start shutting down, it’s better, safer, when he was younger, _stupider_, he could never stop himself, always had to yell or snap back, say something stupid like if he just said the right words he could pretend he had any real power. But it only ever made things worse, Smurf wanted her sons to be strong and wild, but only if she could control them.

So he shuts down a little, just enough to survive whatever's coming, just enough that he can pretend when he eventually caves for whatever she’s here for, that he had any real say in it.

“Don’t be rude, I just wanted to see my baby surf.”

_Y__ou could do that at home_ he doesn’t scream, the words clawing in his throat, battering against the back of his teeth as he keeps them clamped tight. She's close enough to get a hand running through his hair, brushing it roughly with her fingers, straightening it and making him presentable. She smiles when she's done.

“You're always so highly strung, Deran. Aren't you supposed to be having some big interview right now?”

A wet thumb smudges at his cheek like he's nine, not a decade older, like he hasn't just gotten out of a shower.

He's gotta go, he thinks, pulling away from her, getting his arms in his shirt and pulling it over his head. She's right, he's got somewhere he's gotta be, he looks away.

And stops.

Adrian's standing there.

He blinks. Adrian's still standing there.

Adrian gives him that half smile, the one he uses when he thinks Deran's being over-dramatic.

_He_ _hates it._

“Adrian?” His voice doesn't sound to weird, he thinks, as he bumps a fist against Adrian's, plays it cool. “Thought you couldn't make it, man, why weren't you surfing?”

“Still couldn't afford it, but I gotta ride down here with your mom.”

Deran tries to calm the fuck down, it doesn't mean anything. It doesn't have to mean anything. His mom. Adrian. The idea of them in a car together.

“Why'd you come down here, why would you come here with _her?”_

“I wanted to to see you, even if I couldn't compete I wanted, you know, to be here for you.” Adrian grins brightly, like he can't hear what Deran's saying. Instead he just reaches out, likes he's gonna _hug _him or something, and Deran holds out a hand in warning.

“I didn’t-don’t touch me man, I don’t, I can’t, you shouldn’t have come with her.” He feels sick.

“I couldn’t afford to without the ride, it was just a ride, I didn’t think it was such a big deal.”

“**Well it is**!” He hiss-yells, trying to keep quiet, trying to keep his voice calm ever as he feels his heartbeat ratchet up. He can't cause a scene here.

“Jesus Christ, why do you have to always-?” Adrian cuts himself off, sighing, eyes going skyward, head shaking. He looks like he's so done with Deran.

Deran tries to say something. Tries to think of something that Adrian would want to hear but he can see Smurf watching them, still with that fucking smile on her face. So he takes the easy way out, mutters _I gotta g__o _and gets the fuck away from them.

  
  


He doesn’t really remember the interview. Not in the high excited way that makes the beach interview fuzzy, instead he just feels sick. There's too many cameras, too many eyes looking at just him, he feels raw and exposed in the most uncomfortable way. The interview passes in flashes of him stumbling over words, feeling pale and sweaty, he can’t stop looking around like someone’s going to drag him away, like he’s not supposed to be there, like everyone’s just playing along and any moment now they’re all going to start laughing and they’ll take his trophy and kick him out. He doesn’t throw up on the bubbly blonde lady interviewing him, or her appropriately sporty looking counterpart, but their smiles look fixed and pained, like they just want this to be over too. He can't string a sentence together, and he says fuck way too much, he remembers that, because he can’t just say um like a fucking normal personal.

Later he feels like he's barely holding on, pretending he can't feel the creeping sensation that's screaming in his brain to move, to run, blood pumping too loud in his head like he needs to throw a punch, or take one. Deran tries to keep to himself, sitting as much away from the crowds as he can without it being too obvious, trying to give off _get the fuck away from m__e_ vibes, nursing a beer and the dying embers of the last of many cigarettes, pretending he didn't just embarrass himself on live TV. Hyper aware on a good day on how he might look to outsider, Deran doesn't want the opportunity to embarrass himself again even on a smaller scale. No one else seems to care much, or at least, no one has flat out laughed in his face about it, but it doesn't stop him from feeling like everyone's staring at him.

A beer hovers in front of his face, and he looks past it to see Adrian's freckled face. Deran reaches up and takes it, offers a weak smile in return.

Adrian gives him a compressed almost sad looking smile, and drops down beside him, close enough that their knees knock together a couple of times as Adrian settles himself.

“You alright?”

Deran looks out at the ocean where a few brave swimmers are braving the water despite the cooling afternoon winds and dying light. Part of him wants to throw himself in too. Just swim out and keep going til there was nothing but him and water.

Deran shrugs as he downs the last dregs of his beer and twists the top off the next one. He's alright. Or alright enough. Turning the cap over in his hands he says nothing, just does a kind of bumping sway against Adrian's shoulder before swaying back away.

If it was dark, he thinks, if it was dark and the beach was empty, he'd press his face into Adrian's skin and never come back up.

But it's not that dark, And the beach isn't empty. So he can't and he doesn't.

His mom is out there somewhere, no doubt drinking and belonging more than Deran ever felt he could. Smurf just did that, went anywhere and made the place _hers_. He hates it as much as he envies it. And he hates that even now he wants to find her, bury his face into her lap and let her stroke his hair, let her comfort him til there's nothing but white noise in his head, like she always does when he comes back to her.

He's such a fucking pussy. He _always_ goes back to her. Like a fucking dog.

Adrian doesn't say anything else, just lets Deran wimp out with the inch gap between them. He thinks he could spend the whole night like this, just existing in a quiet space - _a safe place?_ \- drinking and enjoying the company.

Deran feels like he's jinxed himself, thinking like that, because almost immediately he can see someone beelining over towards them. He hunches down low, hopes who ever coming over gets the hint and fucks right off.

As the guy gets closer Deran finally sees who it is, and knows he's fucking cursed.

Brody's grinning, lifting the beer in his hand and swaying it like he's waving. Deran takes a swig of his own beer and, if he stands up right now and walks away, would Adrian follow?

“Hey,” Brody says as he gets close, nodding at Deran like they're best bros, then moving all his attention onto Adrian with a squinting, interested look, “I know you. Adrian, right? You scored the highest wave at Huntington, yeah?”

Adrian looks up, answers with a half shy _yeah man_, and Adrian's smiling, smiling, standing up and shaking Brody's hand, and _smiling._

“Shame we didn't get to see you out there, man.”

“Yeah, I couldn't get down here in time to compete,” Adrian skirts the truth like a pro. “Did get to see the final though, you guys were fucking great.”

“We did alright.” Brody says, all fake humble. “Would have been cool if you'd been out there with us.”

“Ha, yeah,” Adrian answers, shoulders shrugging. “Maybe next time.”

Deran watches them, both of them tall and all long lean lines, they look good together. Deran drains the rest of his beer and thinks very seriously about throwing the bottle in Brody's face. He places it down very carefully, pushing it into the sand so it sits up half buried.

“You two,” Brody pauses, eyes flickering between the two of them, before nodding his head towards Deran, like he hasn't been an asshole to him all day. “How you know Cody?”

“Yeah we. We grew up together in Oceanside.” Adrian answers, smile going a little less bright, but maybe it's still as fond. And Deran doesn't think about the pause between Adrian's words, doesn't think about all the other things he and Adrian could've been.

“Toddlers on boards, right?”

“Yeah, little shithead grommets.” Adrian says, dropping back down beside Deran and bumping Deran's shoulder with his own.

And Deran tries not to keep his face from souring more, why won't this guy just _leave?_

“Hey, heard ESPN wanted to talk to you, how'd it go?” He asks with a sharp edge to his smile like he knows exactly how it went.

_Yeah, fuck you too, Brody, just another two faced son of a bitch that thought he was better than Deran. _

Deran tries to smile back – knows it's more of a glorified baring of teeth – and shrugs like it wasn't an entire shit show.

He half expects Brody to start spitting the shit he's been saying all comp, instead he just looks back at Adrian, smiling and talking like the two of them are best buds.

Adrian always brought the best out in people - made people wanna be his friend - and Deran burns with a depressed sort of envy. He doesn't think he wants that - he doesn't want random fucks deciding they have to be friends - but for once it might be nice if he didn't get immediately judged before he even meets these assholes.

“What're you doing way out here anyway? You should be off getting laid, fucking champion right?”

Deran glares at him, he should get another beer. Just get up and walk away.

“Christ, cheer up, He always this bitchy?” He looks to Adrian, grinning like they're sharing a private joke. “Anyone would think you're the one who just bombed the final against a fuckin toddler, we gotta get you laid man.”

Adrian's smile is a frozen brittle thing, his eyes darting between the two of them. Because he knows Deran's an asshole at the best of times, and they're skirting close to things that make Deran feel hot and itchy in his own skin.

He doesn't want to be that guy, that asshole. But he doesn't know what else to be, how to be anything else. He can feel what little patience he has slipping away. If he just fucks off now, maybe he can pretend he's not someone Adrian can't hang around in public, someone who can't hold a simple fucking conversation without taking offense to every goddamned thing.

“I'm just messing with you,” Brody laughs, just to, Deran figures, break the awkward place he's put them all in. “Seriously though, I'm gonna take my own advice.”

Brody takes a long drink of the beer in his hand, drains it, thin lines of beer run over his chin and down his throat. He grins and Deran's not staring.

“Some older chick's been making moves on me all afternoon. Imma get drunk as fuck and hit that hard.” He grins, shrugging like he was doing the world a favor and Deran looks skyward to avoid rolling his eyes completely out of their sockets. “Sure fucking thing.”

Brody's looking across where the crowds shifting in time to the music, where there's the heaviest concentration of people. Adrian follows his gaze, and Deran doesn't care about whoever the fuck this asshole is trying to get with, but then Adrian stiffens beside him and Deran _has_ to look.

_Smurf's_ watching them from the edge of the crowd, slowly sipping her drink and _watching_ them. Watching Brody?

Deran can feel his face going red, every little shit thing of the day suddenly in the forefront of his mind and Brody makes a squawking glee filled noise.

“Oh shit you know her?”

Deran glares, he can't speak, suddenly more embarrassed than he's ever felt before.

“Ho-ly shit Cody, that your mom?” Brody crows, pleased like he knows exactly how this is all making Deran feel. “Mother fucking MILF alert, no wonder all you boys still live at home, she’s hot as fuck.”

Deran doesn’t feel himself move, just loses himself in a rapid flurry of punches, Brody on the ground, face all blood and grits of sand digging into where Deran's opened his face up. One minute his fists are aching from how tight he’s clenching them, about to hit some more, the next Adrian's got his arm around Deran's neck, elbow forcing his chin up, yanking him up off the Brody, up til his feet are off the ground. Deran's knuckles are raw and bloody and everything is very quiet.

Adrian drags him further back, til his body's plastered against Deran's back, with no air in between. He hates how much he wants to just sag into that grip, let Adrian hold him for fucking ever. But he _can't._

Deran selfishly lets himself have a second, a moment, then shoves away.

“Get off me, man.” He doesn't have to say any more, Adrian lets him go fast enough that his balance is shot for a few stumbling steps.

He thinks about going at Brody again, but Adrian shifts like he can see what Deran's thinking, like he's going to step in front and ward him away.

Sour bile burns in his throat, _he doesn't want this_, everything's gone wrong and he doesn't know how to make any of it better.

Deran sways for a moment, indecision clawing at his insides, then he staggers away, leaves them all to each other and tries to pretend he can't hear his mother's echoing laughter standing out from the rest of the noise as he walks away.

  
  


It doesn't take him long to find Craig, at the point in his life, Deran's been around him long enough that he's almost got the asshole on some sort of mental GPS. He is, surprisingly, _thankfully_, not naked or in the middle of getting another STI,

“Hey. Get up.” He says, punctuating with a kick to Craig's side. We're going

“What? Come on man, I'm too high to look your shitty sour fucking face, little bro,” Craig glares at Deran, then the sky, “What the fuck, it's still night time, go the fuck to sleep, jesus christ.”

“Fine,” Deran feels his mouth flatten more, and he lets his toe dig a bit harder with the next kick. “Get a fucking ride home with Smurf then, asshole.”

He crouches down, and starts rifling through Craig's pockets; keys weren't in his backpack, so Craig's gotta be holding them.

Craig groans and half heartedly slaps at his hands but he's probably high and definitely too drunk to have the co-ordination to hamper Deran's search by much.

“Aww, come on man.” Craig groans rolling away from Deran hands.

“Shut the fuck up, where the fuck are the keys, Craig?”

“Who pissed in your Cheerios?” No matter how drunk or high he is, Craig's starting to wake up, his avoiding getting livelier if not any better at warding Deran's hands away.

“I wanna go home, give me the fuckin keys.”

“Home? I thought we were staying a couple of days? You know, beach, babes and blow in Baja?”

“You wanna stay and party with Mama fucking everyone you talk to? Be my fucking guest. Just give me the fucking keys, Craig.”

“Jesus Christ.” Craig groans and sits up to shove Deran off him. “Alright, alright, Christ, alright.”

It's a trial and a half to get Craig up and heading towards the scout. He's conscious, but the sort of awake that Deran would have better luck convincing him to get his face tattooed than have a full sentenced conversation with him.

Still.

He's up and walking in the right direction even if he's using Deran as a crutch most of the time.

Craig's half weight suddenly becomes his full weight and Deran stumbles, almost face plants into the sand before he manages to steady the both of them.

“Are you a-?”

Craig snores in his ear.

“”Wake the fuck up asshole!”

Deran stands still for a long time, contemplating dropping Craig in the sand. He has the keys now, he could just do it. _He could_.

Craig's big brother six sense must kick in because before Deran can dump him on his ass, he comes awake with a wild flailing of limbs that sends them both crashing to their knees in the sand.

“I hate you,” Deran says as Craig's arm snakes around his shoulder and squeezes with a _you love me._

“I hate you, get off me.”

“You're like a wet cat.” Craig squeezes him just long enough for Deran to start thinking about digging an elbow into Craig's ribs. “Grumpy.”

“I wanna go home, Craig.” Deran hates how small his voice sounds. “Can we get in the car now?”

Craig's arm squeezes him again and Deran's too tired to shove it off, then he's being lifted and they're upright again. And Deran _hates_ Craig.

Craig second wind last long enough for Deran to have to wrestle him into the passenger seat and a heated discussion about who was driving where Craig makes several grabs for the keys and then finally sprawls out as best his can and starts snoring again.

Deran closes the door as best he can without jamming too many of Craig's limbs. He leans n the door and gives himself a moment to breathe. He could still kick Craig out, he could still just go alone.

_But he doesn't want to._

He doesn't want to be alone.

He contemplates for another moment once he's in the car. Craig's taking up every available space on his side, neck at an angle that'd would leave Deran sore for weeks. He leans over and buckles Craig's seatbelt.

Then he drives.

After the inspection point some five hours later Craig suddenly sits up and decides he's sober and _needed_ to drive.

Right now.

Deran manages to keep the driver's seat for the next hundred miles, while Craig swings between drumming the dash, attempting to climb into Deran's seat while he's still occupying it, and dropping back into a dead sleep, but eventually Craig hasn't fallen asleep for an hour and Deran's about to drive off the road with his own need to sleep.

Deran sleeps through the next couple of hundred miles, through the border checks and wakes up to San Diego exit signs.

Cheek jammed uncomfortably up against the door, Deran stares at the traffic. They've hit peak hour and a sea of red tail lights blur through his sleep crusted eyes.

The loud growl of motorcycle engines starts to drown out all of the other noises, as one, two, three bikes weave through the almost stock still traffic. Deran finds his eye following their progress, all tanned bare arms and leather vests covered in outlaw patches.

A car beeps his horn as one of the bikes cuts in front of them, but a the rider just flips the car off, and another of the bikers rides past slow and deliberate, eyes looking at the car's driver over the top of dark sunglasses. Deran doesn't know what that look had been like up close, but the car doesn't move even as traffic starts to shift, and when it does finally lurch forward, the driver's in no hurry to catch up to the place they'd been in.

The sound of the motorcycle engines dies out long before traffic starts moving enough for Craig to shift the scout to third gear and actually stay in it.

Another higher pitched engine buzzes past, a sleek japanese model cutting past traffic like the roads were empty. Deran can't help his eyes following the brightly colored machine, following it's movement with envy, or some unnameable emotion that stuck in his throat.

He feels trapped.

Craig nudges him, Deran feels his shoulder move with the motion, as Craig nods to the bike he's watching.

“Should get you one of them, fuck this traffic.”

“Can't carry a surfboard.” Deran mumbles into the door, just to be an asshole, even though he's thinking pretty much the same thing. Same thing, or something similar enough.

One of the kids he'd hung around in juvie had ended up prospecting for one of the many SoCal biker gangs, he thinks. Fuck, probably a heap of them did, there was something to be said for a ready made family that didn't shy away from juvie kids with bad tempers.

The guy Deran had known had had a sweetheart name and a mean right hook. And the darkest eyes Deran had ever seen.

Angel had been a couple of years older than him – but so had pretty much everyone else that first time – but he'd been nice enough to Deran when he'd been young, stupid and more scared than he'd been willing to admit.

Deran wonders what he's doing now, if he felt freed or trapped by the choices he made.

“When's the next comp?” Craig asks breaking him out of his thoughts.

But Deran just shrugs. There's rules he has for himself, if he doesn't look too excited, doesn't sound too into something, he can have it for longer. And he wants to hold on to this, wants to keep surfing for a long time yet. The day dream every idiot surfer kid has of making it pro, living off surf comp wins, that pipe dream's a little more real than it had been before.

He doesn't want anyone to know that's something they can take from him.


End file.
